Ha Long Bay–Land of 10,000 Photos

Hung, our Hanoi guide, picked us up from the train station at 5:45 a.m., and after checking us into a hotel for 2 hours for showers and breakfast, we hit the road for 3 1/2 hours to drive to Ha Long Bay, located on the Gulf of Tonkin, with more than 1,000 limestone islands, none inhabited, all steep and spectacular. We boarded a wooden junk called Jasmine along with 40 other tourists and headed out for an overnight journey on the water.

The water was shallow, turquoise and warm.

In the afternoon we boarded a small tender and went to a grotto on one of the islands for a look at some archaeological sites, stalactites and stalagmites.

After the grotto, the tender took us to a floating village, Cua Van, where 120 floating homes and 600+ people live year-round, fishing and showing tourists their way of life.

 

The floating village has its own tiny land-based Buddhist temple for prayers and worship.

We boarded a sampan (hand-made grass and tar rowboat), two tourists in each sampan, which was rowed by a local all around the floating village to see the homes, people, their school, and the “grocery store boat” that brings them food for purchase.

 

Even very young children scamper over the boats and docks without life vests, seemingly unsupervised, and we imagine, but don’t know, that they must learn to swim very early.

“Jasmine”, the boat on which we spent the night.

This morning we were transported to a small island where we had the opportunity to climb 418 steps to the top to observe the Bay and scenery from on high.

Overall this constituted a highlight of the trip so far, beautiful scenery viewed from the open-air  deck, with a cold beer or glass of wine (or both, at one time or another), and star-lit sky after sunset. While we were told there were 200 boats in the Bay, the area is so large that they did not overwhelm the natural aspects of the trip at all.

Once again, the Vietnamese people allowed us to “invade their space” without showing any negative reaction, and conveying an imperturbable sense of dignity, maybe because the impacts are so much more benign than they were when “we” (Americans) were here 40 years ago.

Looking Across the Red River in Lao Cai into China

Along The River

Trung Do

Chaya River cruise

Our water buffalo cart

“Hay-low, you buy from me?”

We left Sapa with Thuy May to drive 2 1/2 hours to the Bac Ha Market, the largest in the region, open on Sundays. Photos are already  (hopefully)loaded below, so this will only provide a little commentary.   Every stall has a woman selling handicrafts made by the Flower H’Mong people, or more often machine-made in China to look like the hand-made items of the Flower H’Mong.  Clothing, dishes, purses, art objects, food (mostly unrecognizable to our Western eyes), and animals including chickens, pigs, dogs, ducks, horses and even water buffalo which go for about 2,000,000 dong or $1,000 U.S. we’re told.

After the market we were dropped off for a water buffalo  cart ride through the Tay people’s village of Trung Do (300 residents) to the Chay River where we boarded a boat for an hour-long ride. The scenery along the river was spectacular and matches all our stereotypes of the area:  vastly overgrown jungle, hills, fog, and shorelines dotted with tiny homes and clothes hanging out to dry, with small children and water buffalo walking among the rice fields.

Finally we returned to Lao Cai where we had dinner with Thuy May at a restaurant across the street from the train station, then boarded the Victoria Carriage at 9pm for another all-night train ride back to Hanoi.  We all got 5-6 hours of sleep, so seem to have adjusted to Vietnam time, finally (14 hours ahead of Seattle).

This is a fascinating trip, and we’re enjoying it immensely.

We spent the morning at the market in Bac Ha

Check-in/OK, Chay River

Latitude:22.45252
Longitude:104.23193
GPS location Date/Time:10/23/2011 00:38:34 PDT
Riverboat ride with spectacular scenery
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A photo that explains our comment that yesterday's hike was "rough"

Hike in the Hills

We met Thuy May in the hotel lobby at 9am to undertake a hike in the mountains above Sapa through 3 “minority” villages, the term they use to describe any of the tribal people who live outside cities and speak a language other than Vietnamese.

 

It was a hot humid day, and the trail was very rough in spots and sometimes muddy and steep, so even though it was reported to be only 6 miles, it felt tough to us.  

Immediately on alighting from the van at the trailhead, we were surrounded by 20 or so women and girls wanting to sell us various woven and needlepoint items. Thuy May had warned us that if we engaged them at all in conversation, or responded to their questions, they would follow us throughout the entire day.  So we ignored them or nodded “no” in answer to any questions, but still at least a dozen of them followed very closely, crowding us and repeatedly asking “Where you from? What your name? You buy from me?” After about 30 minutes, all but one dropped off and went looking for better prospects.

One, who Bob and David labeled “The Minder” followed us the entire day – 6 hours – offering a hand to help us on rough terrain, trying to point out things to us, and even Thuy May couldn’t communicate with her as The Minder spoke no Vietnamese. It made us feel badly, and at the end of the day Lynn bought a small needlepoint purse from her.

We wandered through the Black H’Mong village of Lao Chai (so-called because their traditional attire is primarily black), had lunch in the Ta Van village where the Zay hill tribes live, and finally wandered through a bamboo forest and many rice fields to the Red Dao village of Giang Ta Chai where we again met our driver to return to the hotel.

Random Things We’ve Noted

With the exception of many moths, and a couple of small roaches, we’ve seen no bugs. We could have left our DEET at home, at least so far.

Many Vietnamese people who work in the tourism industry always wear “traditional” Vietnamese attire. Otherwise, people on the streets are dressed in Western attire, primarily jeans,  casual slacks or skirts,and shirts of one sort or another.

The level of public politeness is unlike anything we’ve experienced in the U.S. or elsewhere in our travels.  We’ve heard and read that Vietnamese people do not respect  standing in line and waiting their turn, but we have yet to experience this.

There are very few dogs here, unlike in the U.S. where people take their dogs with them almost everywhere.

Far fewer people smoke than we expected, and most hotels and restaurants appear to be “no smoking”, though the restaurant where we ate last night had a few patrons who smoked throughout their meal.

We feel entirely safe from any sort of crime, including the petty theft our Hanoi guide warned us of.  We seem not to be of particular interest to locals when we walk the streets of a city or village. We were told to always carry a purse or backpack on the front of our shoulders, not the back, but this measure feels unnecessary, though we continue mostly to follow it.

At 6a.m. this morning very loud music with a thumping bass erupted in the town below our hotel and continued for awhile. We aren’t sure, but can only guess it is the call to morning exercises, as we observed in Hanoi.

English is the universally spoken second language here, not French, despite the many years of French occupation in the first half of the 20th century.  Travelers from Europe and other Asian countries all seem to communicate with the Vietnamese in English, and Thuy May says English language classes now begin in primary school.

Our Hanoi guide told us that 2o and 30 years ago 98% of the population was illiterate, but the government began providing and requiring primary school attendance 15-20 years ago, and now all of the population below a certain age is literate.

Our Hanoi guide told us about government-imposed population control measures, much like China’s, except here families are allowed two children each. We’re also told the limitation is widely ignored in the rural parts of the country where parents still want to have many children to help with farming work and the government does little or no enforcement.

Dinner Adventure

We walked down the hill from our hotel into town for dinner. After passing many places and finding no particular reason to select one over another, we wandered into one. 

We ordered beer  and “Blackened Chicken Hot Pot”, as everyone in the restaurant seemed to have ordered  one or another type of “Hot Pot”.  Turns out they bring plates of raw ingredients including the blackened chicken, tofu, cabbage, some sort of leafy green vegetable we did not recognize, sliced tomatoes, choco and rice noodles. Almost all people in the restaurant appeared to be Vietnamese and knew what to do, but the employees could tell we did not, so two of them returned repeatedly to our table to instruct us (in Vietnamese and hand signals) how to cook our meal at our table. 

The whole experience turned out to be hilarious or off-putting, depending on your perspective. After seeing many bizarre offerings on the menu (such as horse lung, horse intestines, and horse penis alcohol – really!) we felt we had made a tame selection, but the blackened chicken turned out to be interesting – it looked like ordinary chicken except it was, in fact, black, and we have no idea why!? 

In the end we decided it was a worthwhile adventure, but we might try the pizza place tomorrow night.

Around Sapa

Our new guide, Thuy May, met us at the train station with a van and driver, and we made the one-hour drive up to Sapa at the 5,000-foot level in the mountains. The weather was foggy and cooler than in Hanoi. We dropped our luggage at the hotel, had breakfast (Pho), then began our morning tour.

Thuy May (pronounced “Twee-May”) directed our travel to Heaven’s Gate, where we were told we’d have a wonderful view of Fansipan, the tallest mountain in Vietnam at about 10,000 feet, but it was socked in with fog and there was nothing to see.

Next we went on an hour-long hike to Golden Stream Love Waterfall, most of which hike Thuy May did barefoot, telling us she did not own her first pair of shoes until age 9.

Last we went to Silver Waterfall, a short but steep walk up concrete steps to a lovely viewpoint halfway up the waterfall.

This area is populated by 25 different tribes of people in villages, including various types of Hmong, and they specialize in crafts including weaving and needlework, and wear elaborate and beautiful outfits.

Train Ride

Twenty-six years ago we flew to San Francisco for our honeymoon, then just for the fun of it, took the Amtrak train back to Seattle. We haven’t been on a long-distance train ride again until last night, when we took the Victoria Carriage from Hanoi to Lao Cai.

The train left Hanoi at 9pm, and we had reservations for a “two-person berth”.  Turns out there was only one two-person berth on each train car, and all others were 4-person berths, so we were on a different car from Lynn and David.  The 2-person berths and 4-person berths were identical in size (tiny!), and as much as we like Lynn and David, we were happy not to share, as whenever either of us wanted to rummage through our suitcase, we had to pull it from underneath the narrow bed while the other person pulled their feet off the floor to make room.

The bed was reasonably comfortable, and there was air conditioning, but the ride was rocky and noisy, so we used ear plugs.  At 5:00 a.m. we were awake (still suffering jet-lag), and at 5:45 they began knocking on cabin doors to announce our imminent arrival  in Lao Cai and serve coffee.

David and Cathryn each report sleeping reasonably well and are able to take naps in the afternoon when the schedule allows; Bob and Lynn haven’t  sleep well at night and don’t nap well either, so are suffering more from jet-lag still.

Check-in/OK Heavens Gate, outside Sapa

Latitude:22.35585
Longitude:103.76147
GPS location Date/Time:10/20/2011 19:42:12 PDT
Message:We are happy, well and having fun.
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Hanoi Streets

We leave Hanoi at 9:30 tonight to take an overnight train to Lao Cai, then on to Sapa an hour further by road. This is in the northwestern part of the country, only a mile or two from the China border. 

Here are some scenes from our final afternoon in Hanoi. Almost all city transportation occurs by motorcycle, and they are everywhere in very large numbers. Being in the city has provided a bit of sensory overload, but in a wonderful way, with unfamiliar sights, sounds and smells everywhere. The Vietnamese people are uniformly polite and friendly.

Hanoi Flower Market

This post fills in the “blanks” from last night, referenced in an earlier post.

After being picked up at the Hanoi airport by Hung, our guide, at 11pm Wednesday night, he suggested we go directly to the Hanoi Flower Market because it is busiest and most interesting during the night.

It’s a wholesale market, and flower farmers from the rural areas outside the city arrive by motorcycle or small truck, loaded down with just-cut flowers, which then are displayed and bought by city folks who will re-sell them at florists shops the next day.

A huge percentage of the flower buds had been wrapped by hand in paper to protect them during transport.  Images can tell the rest of the story.